If you need to enter an opening balance (when Visma Business is first used), the period should be set to a single period earlier than the period from which you wish to start your accounts.
Example
To start your accounts from July 1st, enter the balance in June so that it is not entered as a flow in July.
Remember first of all to create the accounting periods in the Accounting periods table. It is a good idea to store the previous year's figures or the figures for the year so far, because this allows you to compare the accounting figures with the figures of previous periods in the PL and balance sheet reports.
Balances are stored as normal vouchers in the accounting system, but it is advisable to organise them into separate batches.
It is a good idea to divide balance entry into three categories:
The usual procedure is to input customer entries in separate batches, supplier entries in separate batches and the general ledger individually.
In the case of customer/supplier balances, you can either input a single open balance for each customer/supplier, or the open entries individually. If you want to set up a working reminder, interest computation and/or payment system right from the start, all open entries relating to customers/suppliers should be entered individually. You must use a voucher type relating to incoming or outgoing invoices/credit notes (where applicable in foreign currency). In the Vouchers table supplied with the standard table structure, you can use voucher types 11 to 15/21 to 25.
For the sake of clarity, you should use the original invoice/credit note number for customer entries. If you are only entering a balance per customer/supplier, you are free to use a separate voucher number series, for example from voucher number 80000 (or another series which will not be used later). It is important to take care with the voucher date when you enter open entries. The voucher date must be set to the actual voucher date of the entries in order to obtain a working reminder/interest computation system immediately. Alternatively, you can enter the due date for the entries.
If Debit/credit control is enabled in the Bedriftsopplysninger table, you either need to create an interim account as a cross entry to the customer/supplier ledger account balances, or temporarily disable the option.
Remember to enable debit/credit control again afterwards.
If debit/credit control is not used, the customer and supplier entries can be entered without cross entries. When the batch/batches is/are updated, the customers are automatically cross-posted to the customer/supplier general ledger account in the normal way. When you enter the general ledger balance, you must enter the balance for all accounts, with the exception of general ledger accounts for debtors and creditors.
If you do not wish to specify the balance of open entries per customer/supplier, you can instead enter a global open balance directly in the customers/suppliers accounts, along with the other general ledger account balances. To do this, you may need to uncheck the suspended field of the general ledger accounts to be allowed to post entries direct to the general ledgers for customers and suppliers. After entering and updating the balances, remember to disable direct posting to the accounts.
When you enter the PL section of the general ledger, you must make sure that tax is not calculated on the balances, particularly if you are entering the balances mid-way through the financial year. To make sure that you do not forget to remove the tax code for an account, you should use a voucher type with the Ignore tax code field enabled. In the Voucher types table supplied with the standard table structure, this field is enabled for voucher types balance and foreign currency balance (voucher types 29 and 30).
When all the balance batches have been updated, you should produce a balance list for checking. The customer and supplier totals must be the same as the accounts receivable and accounts payable general ledgers (as these are updated automatically). If the general ledger is the same on the debit and credit sides there is no problem, provided the customer and supplier general ledgers have been updated automatically on the basis of the customer and supplier entries.
In cases where debit/credit control and interim posting have been used, the only difference to the above procedure is that the interim account is used to settled the batches. You can enter customers and suppliers to the interim account. When you enter the general ledger, you must post the balances of the accounts receivable/accounts payable general ledger accounts to the same interim account. All the tables should agree in the balance lists.